Political Correctness—Six Sentence Story

Brian told Steve that he better be careful. He could tick off a lot of people.

Since Steve was by disposition a hermit wannabe, except for his internet connection, he said that his goal was to tick off everyone who needed it.

And so he did.

And so they did.

And when that was finished everyone lived happily ever after, or, at least Steve (thought he) (knew he) (wondered if he) did.

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Denise offers the prompt word “hermit” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

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Next week I will be away for a couple of weeks after turning off the computer.

Frequency—Six Sentence Story

With a frequency that annoyed Steve, Brian would tell him, “You better get whatever you were supposed to do done before the world ends.”

“The world’s not going to end,” Steve responded one afternoon putting his attention back on the game which his team was winning.

“You never know,” Brian countered.

“I know.”

“You don’t.”

And just like that, to the surprise of both Steve and even Brian, the world ended.

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Denise offers the prompt word “frequency” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

Luke 12:40 KJV
Be ye therefore ready also: for the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not.

House of Cards—Six Sentence Story

When the scientist complained that just about everything he knew to be true was not, he heard his mind sing, “When the truth is found—duh-duh—to be-e-e-e-e lies!”

“I only said that it wasn’t true, not that it was a lie,” the scientist corrected his mind.

“Sorry,” his mind replied, “but you do know that it was a lie, don’t you?

“Lie, schmie, who cares?”

You do, but apparently you don’t know it yet.”

What the scientist did know was this interchange with whatever it was he kept calling his “mind” could go on and on—and on—and on and on and on and on and on and so he put an end to it by saying, “And with that we move on to the confused conclusion of the last sentence of our story.”

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Denise offers the prompt word “move” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

Faint—Six Sentence Story

Alice wandered through the weeds crediting strange flowers as a source of strength. Regardless, and in spite of appearances, she also trusted that miraculous Light she had grown to long for Who guided her with His caressing warmth and His disciplining heart every time she strayed.

Given all the detours and deceptions she had entertained, as she approached her journey’s end she wondered how she would be received. Would anyone be there to greet her whom she knew over the years? How many allowed themselves to be caught in the quicksand having grown faint along the way?

When Alice finally arrived she found everyone she could now remember waiting for her rejoicing that even she, indeed miraculously even they, made it home.

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Denise offers the prompt word “faint” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

Isaiah 40:31
But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.

Bookstore—Six Sentence Story

Stan entered a used bookstore offering the antique dreams of the late 20th century. Since he remembered the late 20th century he could see his younger self admiring, like Alice chasing the White Rabbit, many of the titles when they were newer, but he wondered why anyone would now.

As he walked the aisles he paused at the Philosophy section bookended between Marxism and New Age Metaphysics like a triple engagement leading to a bizarre wedding. He wondered why philosophy would want to be associated with those wacky mistresses, but then it occurred to him, in spite of his own wacky fascination with it, that that was right where it belonged.

Stan wondered if the best way to keep the Lord from laughing at him was to only fall down those narrow rabbit holes that the Lord Himself offered. Then he could rejoice in the Lord’s wide mercy to quickly catch him rather than let him make a mess of things first.

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Denise offers the prompt word “engagement” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

Colossians 2:8 KJV
Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.

Gloria—Six Sentence Story

Gloria listened to a girl telling her about Jesus in the nursing home. The girl reminded her of her daughter when her daughter was much, much younger and acted more like an angel than Gloria liked to remember her daughter acting today.

The girl told the staff that she was sent there to visit only those nearest the ends of their lives and so a nursing assistant escorted her to Gloria who could no longer speak, but acknowledged others by moving her fingers. Although Gloria repeatedly rejected her own daughter, the girl’s words moved Gloria to lift her hand which the girl held in hers.

The next morning Gloria died and her daughter stopped by to pick up her belongings. Upon hearing of her mother’s last visitor, the dam safeguarding decades of tears collapsed.

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Denise offers the prompt word “lift” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

Light Loop—Six Sentence Story

While Daniel walked the loop around the pond he said to himself, When you see that the voice is not your own and you start doing what ‘it’ tells you to do, even when you know you’ll look stupid if you do, things start happening.

After some steps he continued, When the light finally turns on, you are shocked to realize that this ‘it’ was a ‘he’ all along.

Later, halfway through the loop, Daniel said, Then the ‘he’ gets capitalized and you’re in a relationship you would have thought was nutty only a few years ago.

Then Daniel, feeling he needed to answer some fictional objector walking by his side, said, Of course, there are those who’d claim that they could easily explain all of this away as simply me talking to myself, but it’s also not that hard to come up with explanations that explain away why they like to explain away stuff.

Daniel then addressed a more aggressive, but still fictional, manipulator by asserting, To those who insist I cast Him out as if He were some demon or go to a hell of their own choosing…well, I have no intention of doing either.

By this time Daniel was back at his condo where he paused to conclude, When worry becomes synonymous with silliness and there’s a river of joy waiting to overflow where ever you go, whatever you need will be given to you.

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Denise offers the prompt word “light” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Story.

Double—Six Sentence Story

Since I didn’t know where I was going and since AI serves double duty not only as fiction but also as useful fiction, I put the address of the Six Sentence Story Café and Bistro into my phone while walking along the busy street. All I knew was the café was supposed to be somewhere in the area.

The voice coming from my phone told me to turn right so I entered the quieter side street, passed a cobbler shop and then a seamstress storefront which specialized in wedding dresses. As I continued walking I wondered if the software had any better idea than I did where the café was, but then I saw the three granite steps and Nick who let me in. Once inside I could smell Tom‘s cooking and there was Denise at the bar with Mimi while Chris and Clark sat at a table near the stage.

It was a wonderful place with wonderful people something my phone would never be able to appreciate although it did have enough fictional brains to show me how to get there.

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Denise offers the prompt word “double” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

This is my second story for the prompt, motivated by Clark who gave me a good description of the Six Sentence Story Café & Bistro which I am mostly repeating.

Red and Yellow with Background Green

Double Double—Six Sentence Story

Brian opened his eyes to the realization that reality wasn’t rational. True premises prophesying his doom like a curse of double double toil and trouble ran into the miraculous which flooded him with undeserved blessings that falsified the dreadful, but supposedly necessary, conclusions.

Although fond of a rational-enough universe that he could manipulate, what bothered Brian was that he didn’t know Whom to thank for the unexpected change of outcome. Who kept evil from winning when it held all the tarot cards in its hand as Brian failed to find solid ground in karma’s quicksand?

The problem may simply have been that Brian hadn’t completely awaken from his dreams which undermined a rational reality. But the miracle did occur and the prophesies over his life were voided and that left Brian overwhelmed with rejoicing.

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Denise offers the prompt word “double” for this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

A tangled web of rationality

Grain—Six Sentence Story

Like most of us Jerry believed in neither gods nor demons. Nonetheless, he had no more than a grain of sanity planted in that noodle of his since he kept insisting we were computer simulations. I’d ask him, what did he think we were simulations OF anyway, to smack some sense into him, but it didn’t work.

Eventually something did happen to Jerry (not my doing, mind you), that caused him to start following Jesus, of all people, especially since just the day before he was talking that simulation nonsense.

Jerry spent the last year blooming like a goofy, exotic flower which truly amused us. I’d remind him, though, on occasion, that by his own assessment he wasted most of his life since he “repented” of nearly all of it (including the simulation stuff), but all he could say was that he wondered when I would stop wasting mine.

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Denise offers the prompt word “grain” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

Fancy flower next to the cathedral in St. Augustine, Florida.